Go Softly Into Thy Gentle Night
by JuliaBeth
Summary: Snape's about to find out he has a fifteen year old daughter he's never seen. Chapter two is up. Cat and Severus meet.
1. Changes

October 31  
  
Today was my birthday, I turned fifteen.  
  
Today they came. Momma hadn't seen it, I guess. I don't know why not. She's never missed a predication before. She has always known when everything was going to happen. She even knew right down to the hour when I would get my first visit from Auntie Rosie. So, why didn't she know that son of a bitch was going to come after us today? Why did she know that she was going to die today?  
  
Holiday says he's going to take me to my father in England. He says they'll come after me again. He says they'll never find me there. No one else knows my father lived in England. That's why Hogwarts is safe. He says StarRidge isn't. They went to school there and they know how to get in.  
  
I don't want to go and live with my 'father'. My sperm donor is all he really turned out to be. I don't want to go. I don't know him. My dad. He divorced my momma before I was even born. I've never even seen him, now I have to go and live with him? I don't know why Holiday is insisting I go to England. My father didn't want me fifteen years ago, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't want me now. Holiday says I don't know the real story and I'd be surprised if I did.  
  
It's time to go now. I wish I could refuse, but its useless. Holiday says they'll kill me if they find me again. He has to get me out of here. They think I have it, but I don't. I never have.  
  
I have to go. I have no choice.  
  
Catherine Livinia Mays  
Cat stood , tucked her journal into her bag, fastened her cape around her shoulders, and pulled the fur line hood up until it hid her face.  
  
"You know this is for your own protection, right?" Holiday, her mother oldest friend.  
  
She nodded.  
  
He took her hand, led her to the fireplace, threw in some Floo powder, and stepped in. She caught one last look at her old home before she was sucked down the fireplace.  
  
A few minutes later, they stepped out at a castle.  
  
"Holiday, this place is creepy," she protested. "I don't want to stay here. Please, don't make me stay. Please!" Even at fifteen, she clung to her protector's cape. "I promise I'll be good. I don't want to leave you. I'll behave. I won't skip school no more, or sneak out again just take me with you. Don't leave me here!"  
  
"Baby girl, you can't stay with me. That's the first place he'll go. I can't keep watch over you and straighten Maddie's mess out too. You need constant protection and I can't give you that right now," he sighed. He wanted to take her with him. He really did, but this was the only way to protect her. "Come on."  
  
But, she refused to move. Holiday rolled his eyes and pointed his wand at her feet. They began to move on thier own.  
  
"Quit it, Holiday," she snapped. "I'll walk. I know how. I've been doing it for quite some time now. You don't have to put a spell on my feet."  
  
He knocked on the door. "Please, Catherine, behave yourself."  
  
She refused to reply.  
  
A dark haired, skinny man opened the door. "May I help you?"  
  
"I need to see Professor Severus Snape," Holiday answered. "It's most important."  
  
"And you are?"  
  
"Just tell him Ms. Maddie sent me," Holiday replied.  
  
"I'm a janitor, not a bloody butler," Filch walked away muttering. He did, however, relay the message who was in the Great Hall, having dinner and watching Draco, who was at one isolation table, glaring at Harry Potter who was at the other. Another one of the idiotic squabbles had landed them both in trouble after they had accidentally turned Professor McGonagall into a field mouse.  
  
"A visitor?" Snape replied. That was odd. "Did they give thier name?"  
  
"He just said to tell ye that Ms. Maddie sent him."  
  
"Ms. Maddie?"  
  
"That's what I said."  
  
Snape was out of his chair like a shot. "Filch, sit here, keep an eye on Mr. Malfoy and Potter, if they so much as move thier chairs one inch before thier prefects say it's time to go give them detention until they graduate." He was gone before Filch could reply. 


	2. Welcome to Hogwarts

Snape rushed in the main hallway to see Holiday, his ex-wife's closest friend, and a small cloaked figure standing behind him.  
  
"Holiday," he said. "Is something wrong? Why did Maddie send you for me?"  
  
"Severus," Holiday began. "I have a lot to tell you. Some very important things. Is there somewhere we can talk privately?"  
  
"We'll go to my classroom. This way," he led Holiday toward the dungeons. Cat refused to move.  
  
Holiday turned back to Cat, his patience wearing thin, despite all she had been through. "Girl, get over here. Don't make me put another spell on you. You told me you can walk, remember?"  
  
Arms folded across her chest, she slowly made her way across the hall and followed none to closely behind them.  
  
"Sit." Holiday gently pushed her into one of the desk. One slender hand emerged from the cloak and grasped Holiday's hand tightly.  
  
Snape noticed her nails were painted blue with silver stars on them. He began to wonder if the girl was Maddie. That was very much something she would do to her fingernails.  
  
"Severus, Maddie's dead."  
  
"Maddie...? What? No!" He didn't know what to say. He went very pale, even for him and sat down hard. Barely able to breath, he asked, "How? I mean.., why didn't she...?" His words faded off. His Maddie had been the best divination expert he had ever seen.  
  
"Why didn't she see it?"  
  
Severus nodded.  
  
"I don't know, son," Holiday replied. "I don't know that she didn't see it either. You can only see the future, not change it. You know that. Maddie had fell in with a bad wizard. Thought she loved him. Found out too late she didn't."  
  
"That's for sure," Cat mumbled.  
  
"Okay, Cat, okay," Holiday patted her shoulder. "It's okay now. Anyway, apparently, she had come into possesion of a scorcer's stone. I don't know how. When they tried to leave him, he came after them. When he searched the house, and couldn't find it, he kill Maddie and beat Cat."  
  
"They? Cat?"  
  
"Yes, that is the other thing I need to tell you," Holiday sighed. "Maddie should have told you long before now," he paused. "Maddie.., well.., when you two split up and Maddie came home, she was pregnant."  
  
"What?!" Snape's head shot up.  
  
"She was pregnant," Holiday repeated. "You have a daughter. Cat, to be exact."  
  
"Why didn't she ever tell me that, if that's true?" He snapped.  
  
"When she came back to America, she found out she was two months along and she was going to tell you, she said, when the time was right. When you had made up. But then after a few months, she got the divorce decree. She got mad. She refused to tell you, fearing you would take the baby from her."  
  
Severus was speechless, trying to grasp what Holiday was telling him, but Cat wasn't.  
  
She flew out of her seat. "You're lying, Holiday. Momma told me. She said he knew and he didn't want me. You knew," she said to Snape, "and you didn't want me, did you?"  
  
"Child, if I had known about you, then we would have met along time ago," he replied.  
  
"Cat, think about this," Holiday turned her to face him and pulled the hood of her cloak down. "Why would I lie to you?"  
  
At the first sight of his daughter, Severus was shocked. She was the image of Madeliene except her hair. It was purple. She had bruises across her face and her lips were busted. His hands clenched in anger at whoever had done this to her.  
  
"Why would momma?" She challenged Holiday.  
  
"She didn't want you to leave her, and go looking for him," he answered. "Because the Lord knows, she didn't always give you the easiest life."  
  
"Cat?" Severus began.  
  
"Catherine to you," she shot back.  
  
"Catherine, I assure you that I never knew about you," he replied, forcing himself to ignore her tone. "I had no ideal you existed until just now. And as for wanting to, your my child, of course I would want you. Maddie never told me."  
  
Cat turned to face him. "I sincerely hope you mean that." She glared at him. One of her eyes was dark green, the other dark blue, like her mother's. "I don't suppose it ever crossed your mind to ask her, did it?"  
  
"No," he answered, sarcasm leaking into his voice. "I don't suppose it did. Or you would have grown up here at Hogwarts."  
  
"I doubt that."  
  
"Look, Severus," Holiday interrupted. "I know all of this has been a shock to you, but I need a favor. I need you to keep her here until it is safe for her to return to the States. Not long. Just until I have this mess straight. The man that killed Maddie is still out there and as long as he believes Cat has the stone, she's not safe. He will come after and he won't stop until he has what he wants."  
  
Severus continued to stare at Cat. Partly because of how badly she looked, and partly because he was still trying to process all of what Holiday was saying. He had a daughter that Maddie had kept secret for fifteen years. Maddie, his Maddie, was dead at the hands of one of Voldemorts cohorts. He wanted to kill David Rochelle. Not only for Maddie's death, but for the abuse she and Catherine had suffered at his hands. Last;y, he was furious at himself, knowing that this abuse wouldn't have occurred if had just swallowed his pride fifteen years before and gan after Maddie. Then, maybe Maddie would still be alive and Cat, his child, wouldn't glare at him as though she had spent her lifetime hating him.  
  
"Severus?" 


End file.
